The penultimate episode of the Apocalypse Saga has just been released. I originally wanted to call the update "The BOOBonic Plague", but we figured that we needed to add nipples to the Os for the joke to really work and that might be be approved by apple. This update has two chambers in it and was quite a bit of work. Unlike some of the previous updates, we have a lot of functionality that the time pygmies can do (ginger, old, fast, baby). Just so you know, it basically quadruples the work (and the memory) if we decide to make a function compatible with these pygmies.

So, this update has some pretty dark humor to it. You basically give the pygmies a taste of the black death and when they die their bodies don't go away. The just sit on the island or worse, they float in the water like the river Ganges. in order to get rid of them, you have to instruct another pygmy to carry the dead body and dump it on the campfire.

New to the Apocalypse Temple there is the Plague Chamber which holds the disgusting plague fountain. Throw a couple pygmies in it and watch them splash in merriment while contracting a fatal disease. The fun doesn't stop there though, once they have the disease, they can spread it all over the island and even sneeze on other pygmies in order to spread the contagion. You can even get the animals of pocket god sick enough to barf and die. The ape, shark, monkey, and T-Rex all get to enjoy the fun.

The second chamber is the Purification Chamber. This came out of my own fascination with the rampant germaphobia in our society. People using paper towels to touch the bathroom door, and making a big deal to rush out of the bathroom without touching anything, or the constant use of Purell whenever you are sitting downstream of someone with questionable hygiene. I just think it's silly, the anxiety that people go through when 10 years ago no one really cared and didn't seem to get sick any more or less than people do today. Not to mention the constant use of hand sanitizer probably makes things worse in the long run because it also kills good bacteria and makes the bad bacteria stronger.

So the Purification Chamber has the PureHell fountain which turns the pygmies into little germaphobes. They carry around little bulbs of hand sanitizer that they use to wash their hands and squirt on dirty pygmies. I wanted to make it so they used a leaf to open the restroom door but we already had too many animations to create for the update. That said, PureHell spreads the same as the plague and will eventually vaporize the pygmy.

The Pygmy can infect objects with both diseases as well, the ape altar, bongo, winch, outhouse, etc. the object will actually hold onto the disease and infect any new pygmy that comes in contact with it. If a pygmy is already infected, we roll a dice and either the pygmy infects the object with their disease, or they get the object's.

This episode also has a monster skin pack created by our friend Aaron Blecha. It's our second "guest artist" pack. We hope you like it, hopefully we will do more guest packs in the future. I know Allan will love that, it will allow him to focus on the runs.

We are also advertising our new Pocket God action figures on the front page of the app. We are going to do an official announcement and contest in a couple weeks. At that time they will be available at most Barnes and Noble stores but are available now for pre-order in the Pocket Shop. We have 4 large figures that look amazing (two pygmy versions, the zombie, and moon witch), and 16 different smaller blind box figures (tons of pygmy poses, old, ginger, zombie, ghost, lightning, etc). The blind box figures are like trading cards, you don't know what you get until you open the box but then you can trade them with your friends. some pygmies are super rare like the red zombie from our PGU planet of the dead poster.

Our next update will have the two last rooms which will complete the apocalypse. One last Chamber and then a special area that will spark the actual apocalypse. This next one should be interesting, it will be like a mini adventure game. you will have to figure out how to unlock certain actions to bring the story to the next phase. you will be responsible for starting, and then saving the world from the apocalypse.

Will the next update resolve the issue of Pocket God not getting past the loading screen on some devices?

I just released a new update that should fix the problem with not getting past the loading screen. it also fixes multiplayer battle of the gods, and removes open feint. challenge mode is now done through game center.

it will probably take a couple hours to show up in your updates. but please let me know if you run into any serious issues so I can turn around a fix. This was a major update that affects a lot of complex code, so I wouldn't be surprised if there were issues.

I just released a new update that should fix the problem with not getting past the loading screen. it also fixes multiplayer battle of the gods, and removes open feint. challenge mode is now done through game center.

it will probably take a couple hours to show up in your updates. but please let me know if you run into any serious issues so I can turn around a fix. This was a major update that affects a lot of complex code, so I wouldn't be surprised if there were issues.

Thanks, Dave. I will tell you if there's something wrong.
Well, Battle of the Gods online is now working, I never had the crash problem, so, all good as of Me! Is it Me, or you also added some new challenges?

The gamecenter changes are really cool.... Much better than openfeint. I was challenging people to things like shark snaps, bird bombs, and Dance Dance Execution without having to wait for the other person to get around to accepting the challenge. Not only can you play your friends, but you can also Auto-Match random people just like with Battle of the Gods. Really cool. The only thing weird is getting to the results page, and then also seeing the final scores. The scores are all cut off because the window that Apple gives us is too small to list the name of the game, the players name, and the scores. I know I won the matches, but I cant see the final scores. Other than that though, its pretty fun. Dave, how do you get into the cue to be auto-challenged? I can auto-challenge other people, but how do I set myself up so that someone can auto-challenge me? Do you just have to be playing Pocket God while connected to gamecenter?

The gamecenter changes are really cool.... Much better than openfeint. I was challenging people to things like shark snaps, bird bombs, and Dance Dance Execution without having to wait for the other person to get around to accepting the challenge. Not only can you play your friends, but you can also Auto-Match random people just like with Battle of the Gods. Really cool. The only thing weird is getting to the results page, and then also seeing the final scores. The scores are all cut off because the window that Apple gives us is too small to list the name of the game, the players name, and the scores. I know I won the matches, but I cant see the final scores. Other than that though, its pretty fun. Dave, how do you get into the cue to be auto-challenged? I can auto-challenge other people, but how do I set myself up so that someone can auto-challenge me? Do you just have to be playing Pocket God while connected to gamecenter?

I know, Game Center is nt perfect for what we are doing, we almost have to code our own matchmaking dialog for it to work better.

For automatch, if you automatch and there is someone waiting for an automatch, then you will match with them. If there is no one waiting, then you will wait for the next auto match user. It just so happens that someone is always waiting in your situation.

Dave, I've found some minor glitches. When an object is infected or purificated, the effect not always shows in front of it, but sometimes behind it. And, sometimes, when a Pygmy pick up a purificated object, the effect start to bounce and shake. Nothing important, just to let you know.

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